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Crypto Token Listings on Major Exchanges Already Surpass Last Year’s Total – BNN Bloomberg
Lucas Matheson, CEO of Coinbase Canada, joins BNN Bloomberg to share his predictions for the cryptocurrency industry in Canada.
(Bloomberg) — Another sign that cryptocurrencies are back in vogue is that more new tokens were listed on major digital asset exchanges in the first half of this year than in all of 2023.
On higher-volume exchanges, including Binance and Bybit, coin listings rose a cumulative 11.6 percent to 2,066 in the first six months of the year, according to an analysis of select exchanges by CCData for Bloomberg. Among a handful of lower-volume exchanges, including CoinJar and BTC Markets, listings rose nearly 32 percent to 488, the researcher found.
The tally comes from so-called centralized exchanges like Binance or Coinbase Global Inc. that have custody of users’ assets. The figure does not include the deluge of memecoins inspired by Internet memes or trends that are traded on decentralized exchanges like Uniswap that allow users to maintain control over their assets. More than a million memecoins have already been issued this year.
The surge in listings on centralized exchanges has been driven by this year’s rally in cryptocurrency prices, which has been led by a more than 50 percent rise in market indicator Bitcoin. Expectations for greater regulatory freedom have been boosted by the approval of Bitcoin and Ether ETFs in the United States this year, along with growing speculation that Donald Trump will be more crypto-friendly if elected president in November.
“I am optimistic that the shift in political and regulatory stance toward cryptocurrencies will begin to drive positive change,” said Cosmo Jiang, a portfolio manager at digital asset firm Pantera Capital. “In particular, I hope that with increasing regulatory clarity, tokens with real value tied to strong fundamentals will stand out and those with no real value like memecoins will lose out.”
Startups have also started launching tokens again, from memecoins to gaming coins, as a way to fund operations or expand community support. This is a big change from 2022, when cryptocurrency markets tanked following a series of scandals and failures like the collapse of the FTX exchange.
The peak of new listings on centralized exchanges is likely still lower than in 2021, according to researcher Kaiko. Listings fell more than 50% in 2022 and fell another 20% last year, Kaiko said.
Bybit, which has seen its trading volume and market share increase, has been the most prolific lister among high-volume exchanges, with listings up 83 percent since the start of 2023, CCData found. Coinbase has been the most conservative, with its listings up 8.2 percent over the same period, CCData said.
“So far this year, we’ve had a mixed bag, with Binance listing less aggressively than before, but other exchanges ramping up new listings,” said Dessislava Aubert, senior analyst at Kaiko. “As a result, the overall number of listings has increased since the start of the rally, but not as fast as in previous cycles.”
New tokens typically help boost spot trading activity. Bybit’s trading volume in June was 33 percent higher than in December, according to CCData. Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, saw its trading volume decline slightly over the same period.
Binance settled charges with the U.S. Department of Justice and several other agencies in November, agreeing to a $4.3 billion fine. It has since tightened listing requirements and made it harder for projects and market makers to work with the exchange.
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